She Was Never Mine
by Leanna Brasslin
Summary: Capaill at their worst, and a boy's thoughts during the November races.


This is living and feeling alive,

because under this saddle she breathes

huffs of hate and sea, racing across

the beach.

This is being alive,

because I am so, so aware, of my body

that sways with the tilts of the saddle,

while salt and sand sting my skin.

The faster ones are ahead, running without

turns. Closer to the end, they throw

the beach in our face, marking us for

our lies, when we pretended we were ready.

The warmer seasons didn't cure her.

She is mad for the ocean, panting, her jaw

drawn open, growling her desire.

The wind is harsh, and everything is

grey, a single color that beats us down

with wet, cold rain.

I had said to my Mother, _I'll finish this strong_.

But between this filly's ears, I see only beach.

Surrounded by predators with riders to pick, but

eyes warming to me, she grins her glee.

Those warmer months and slower gallops,

now nothing but plays, truly just shades, with her

head now curving to bite my leg.

In this battle, she wills to me this promise,

that I won't win this fight, that I won't beat her might.

I hear her clacks, from deep inside, then the crack

of a man's skull. Another rider gone, another kill from

her bleeding lips. Yet a blessing in the rain, for

this rider can't be named. I cannot remember, just

the guilt, that it was not me fallen under her hooves.

I can't sit her, I can't fight her. Wind and rain

drive us back, surrounded by fighters. I won't

finish this race, I'll die like my brother.

The beach tilts in her jolts, and still the

dark colors are painted, darker than grey,

stamped on this long, grey beach. The

white cliffs and crashing waves, taller

than these Capaill; our

only beacons to keep us straight.

Curved in every way but straight,

she is a beautiful, storm-grey filly,

promising with white eyes,

that this dance will end with her

regaining the ocean.

Her speed is wasted, I can't hope to live.

Blinded by salt, what luck I have not

been snatched! The salt makes me blind,

we're not pulling away. I can't ask,

with this stiff numbness and these frozen fingers.

She drips sea foam, she is soaked

from the black clouds, made

blacker against the dark sea.

She is drowning in this weather,

loving the chase. She rips at men till finally we pull away,

from those who are meant to die. She bellows to the rest,

the ones we leave, their cries going unsated, their hunger

lost to the wind. Their hooves mark our graves,

and time ticks till the end.

And still I am scared, scared of being

the one that falls, under this filly and her rotten,

stinking body.

She tilts and jerks, I fly high with her bucks.

I know she wants me dead. Here and now,

we press on, between

the cliffs and the ocean.

She is a storm of terror, and the

wind blesses her efforts.

Gulls circle, undisturbed by her effort.

It is the blessing before the curse,

the grass before the season, as winter strips its color.

It is destroyed before the shining sun, the sound of bodies which strike the sand,

and her hooves beat down their new graves, and for many,

before they ever became men.

She doesn't remember this summer, and I am about to die.

My nose and eyes drip with water, and if I sink lower

in this saddle, she is no better to listen.

Her body lurches, her legs stamp her dance, I cannot

draw her away.

I beg her to spare me.

The ocean flicks, and again she leans.

This is her answer, a promise for me.

She is mad, and my saddle is slipping, my legs have sunk,

down her sides, my ride is over, her bucks draw me further down.

Tomorrow this beach will forget, but today, now, her eye,

swollen black, pinched from the water, looks totally at me.

Stalling the fall from her back, stained with flicks of beach,

blood and bits of more. She is going mad in this race,

as though we did not have our summer days.

I don't know this filly anymore, only that she wants me dead.

This filly that I caught.

This filly that killed two men.

When the grasses were high and warm,

I trusted her then.

Now she is wet, and bellows

for the ocean, and only with my

death can she reclaim the wet.

Waves froth with the promise of

dozens more Capaill.

She is going mad, she is wet with her desire,

spooked by the storm

and still I plead to her ears,

_Don't you remember me at all?_

Still I keep slipping, no longer aiming to win,

I just want to live.

She is wet and raving,

she pulls a man's clothes.

My arms cannot still her jerking head,

my cap vanishes, we pull ahead, and before

she can kill me, we finish the race,

and the weight of her pulls at my face,

I feel drowned, sore, and while I

bellow for my father and friend,

I know I am not lucky at all, because I can't put her aside.

My heart lurches as she whirls,

but when I see the ocean, I swear I won't let her go.

I make oaths at her, saving nothing back.

She cost me a bet, but I won't forget that

tomorrow she'll be hungry, and perhaps a bit sorry.

I'll tread carefully then,

and wait these slow months for blue skies

and sweeter tempers. This malice

will pass, but the cliff path looms ahead.

It's totally dark, her body is shaking;

watching, waiting for that one, ending mistake.

Now my Papa takes her bridle.

The saddle doesn't matter.

I spit blood and her foam,

I swallowed so much more.

The only win is when she gets home,

She has cursed my home, and

broken my mind.

She will kill me and be glad without me,

She won't care if this saddle breaks and I

fall from her back.

She was pulled from her home,

So now she's cursed my ownership.

But in the end, after all, I am only meat,

and that she knew before ever we met upon the beach.


End file.
